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[...] Pity had taken root in Grandet's heart and the lonely girl found it entirely acceptable, but there was something revolting in it. It was a vile miser's pity which cost the old cooper nothing and warmed his heart agreeably, while it was Nanon's whole sum of human happiness. Who can refrain from repeating 'Poor Nanon'? God will know his angels by the tones of their voices and the sadness hidden in their hearts.
i love the shift in the last line
[...] observed Madame Grandet, with a timid glance at her husband, which in a woman of her age was a sign of complete matrimonial subjection, and revealed how thoroughly her spirit was broken,
[...] How horrible is man's condition! He does not own one happiness whose source does not lie in ignorance of some kind.
Into a girl's innocent and uneventful life there comes a day marked with delight, when the sun's rays seem to shine into her very soul, when a flower looks like the expression of her thoughts, when her heart beats more quickly and her quickened brain, in sympathy, ceases to think at all, but all ideas are dissolved in a feeling of undefined longing. It is a time of innocent sadness and vague joys that have no sharpness of edge. [...]
'Aha! You've been treating your nephew to a banquet, I see. [...]' [...]
'A banquet? ...' Charles repeated to himself, quite unable to form any idea of the normal diet and customs of this household.
this made me laugh. they're eating like bread and butter
In the crises of life, when we are overwhelmed by joy or sorrow, we see our surroundings with sharpened senses, and they remain for ever afterwards indelibly part of our experience. Charles scrutinized with strained intentness the box borders of the little garden, the faded autumn leaves floating to the ground, the crumbling walls, the grotesquely twisted branches of the apple trees, picturesque details which were to remain in his memory for ever, eternally bound up with the memory of that supreme hour of early sorrow, by a trick of memory peculiar to deep feeling.
He had been dreaming of an ocean of eight millions in three years, and mentally launching his ships on this long sheet of gold.
Misers hold no belief in a life beyond the grave, the present is all in all to them. This thought throws a pitilessly dear light upon the irreligious times in which we live, for today more than in any previous era money is the force behind the law, politically and socially. Books and institutions, the actions of men and their doctrines, all combine to undermine the belief in a future life upon which the fabric of society has been built for eighteen hundred years. The grave holds few terrors for us now, is little feared as a transition stage upon man's journey. That future which once awaited us beyond the Requiem has been transported into the present. To reach per fas et nefas an earthly paradise of luxury and vanity and pleasure, to turn one's heart to stone and mortify the flesh for the sake of fleeting enjoyment of earthly treasure, as saints once suffered martyrdom in the hope of eternal bliss, is now the popular ambition! [...]
[...] Annette, had compelled Charles to think seriously. [...] She made him both soft and materialistic, a twofold demoralization, but one wholly in accordance with the standards of good society, good manners, and good taste.
[...] they said good night with a smile.
They fell asleep, to dream the same dream; and from that night Charles realized that there were still roses to be gathered in the world, and began to wear his mourning more lightly.